Charles H.Ross & Marie Duval
'Ally Sloper' - 1867
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From 1867, in the Magazine Judy.
The scans here are from a paperback book collection (1873), where the episodes are reassembled on smaller pages, originally they were one-pagers. For more information see below. |
Page 18-39 40-61 62-82 83-103 104-125 126-148 149-176 177-205
(you may want to compare the Shaving episode with a similar one by W.Busch, especially panel 7).
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Charles Henry Ross (1835?-1897.)
Judy; or the London Serio-Comic Journal was launched on May 1, 1867. On 14 August 1867 īRoss illustrated a cartoon entitled Some of the Mysteries of the 'Loan and Discount' which introduced Ally Sloper. Sloper was named from the slang for someone who would slope off down an alley to avoid the rent collector. Sloper disappeared in October after only five appearances but returned December 1, 1869 and before long was appearing every week. Under Ross' hand Sloper was crudely drawn, but on February 10, 1870, Ross handed the artistic chores over to a young French artist, Isabelle Emilie Louisa Tessier (1847-?), who signed her work 'Marie Duval' and who became Ross' wife at the age of 18. The Ally Sloper cartoons and character became incredibly popular and featured in the first British comic book which professed to be Sloper's autobiography, Ally Sloper. A moral lesson (1873), and in 1883 Ross sold his rights in the character to Gilbert Dalziel of Dalziel Brothers, the engravers, who launched Ally Sloper's Half-Holiday on May 3, 1884 for the proprietor W. J. Sinkins although the paper was 'conducted' by Dalziel who later took over entirely, publishing the title from 'The Sloperies', 99 Shoe Lane, EC. The majority of the Sloper cartoons were, by then, drawn by W. G. Baxter. Ross actually invented a character 'Arry Sloper much earlier in a serial for the penny dreadful paper Reynolds's Miscellany in Volume 28, Jan. 25, 1862, entitled In Search of a Wife. A Tale Of The Day. 'He was, besides being the jolliest dog alive, the laziest, most dissolute, and most drunken of scamps......He had been a bad son and was a bad husband; he had beaten his wife and deserted her...' This was illustrated by Frederick Gilbert brother of Sir John Gilbert. (text by John Adcock) And here a quote from: 'The Dictionary of British Book Illustrators and Caricaturist - 1800-1914' (1978) by Simon Houfe - page 438: ROSS, Charles H. active 1867-1883 Dramatist, novelist and illustrator. He was employed in the Civil Service at Somerset House and began to write and draw in his free time. He was brought to the notice of William Tinsley, the publisher who gave him two Christmas annuals to edit describing him as a 'very clever, but very nervous young man'. Ross's facility with writing and drawing won him the Editorship of JUDY where many of his quips and drawings were published in the years 1867-78. Dalziel mentions that they were 'generally signed ''Marie Duval'', his wife's maiden name and the subjects often savoured somewhat of a French origin'. His small lively figures were full of humour but not great satiric art although they had in them the making of real satire. One such was a large-headed man who became Ally Sloper and was taken to great heights by the artist W.G. Baxter (q.v.). Ross was also the proprietor of C.H. ROSS'S VARIETY PAPER. |